Why a B.C. doctor says it’s time to include climate change as a part of diagnoses

"As physicians we need to think what are the underlying causes that bring people in to see us," Nelson physician Dr. Kyle Merritt said.

A British Columbia doctor says it’s time for physicians to begin including climate change as a part of medical diagnoses.

Family physician Dr. Kyle Merritt was working at the Kootenay Lake Hospital and his own clinic this summer when the province was hit by the deadly and unprecedented heat dome, followed by weeks of intense wildfire smoke.

As the number of patients presenting for care surged, he saw a woman in her 70s with congestive heart failure and diabetes, both of which had been exacerbated by the non-stop heat. Discharging her home, to the same overheated conditions, would only make her situation worse, he said.

Merritt admitted the woman to hospital, and added something to her chart he’d never written before: “climate change.”

“When I was documenting, the diagnosis that I put in the chart is congestive heart failure exacerbation — but what I’m talking about (is) what are the antecedent parents, whether they’re triggering things that are going to cause that exacerbation?” he said.

“What we’re really trying to think as physicians about the underlying causes of what’s bringing our patients in, and that was definitely something that came to my mind … of course, it’s not easy to link these things always together.”

Merritt said over the course of the summer, he added the term to the medical records of a handful of other patients where he felt it was clear unusual and extreme conditions, including heat and wildfire smoke, were critical to their health problems.

He stressed that he had not actually diagnosed anyone with “climate change” as an illness, but said it can’t be ignored as a contributing factor in some cases.